It seemed now, though, that an introduction was imminent, for as the rear admiral’s son and the New York problem-solver approached the house the front door opened and a figure holding a lantern and wearing a long white nightgown peered out. “Who’s there?” the figure called: a man’s thin voice, wavering and reedy.

“It’s Julian,” was the answer. And, more sarcastically: “Come home again.”

“Young Julian? Why … I … young Julian?”

“The same. How are you, Windom?”

“I think … my eyes must be deceiving me … my ears also!”

Matthew and Julian were almost at the front steps. The old man in the white nightgown came down to meet them on age-stiffened legs, lifting his lantern up to catch their faces. He stopped, his wizened face open-mouthed, his halo of white hair being blown by the wind and his eyes widening. “My Lord!” he said, almost breathlessly. “Young Julian come home!”

“Hello, Windom.” Julian reached out to quickly pat the old man’s shoulder, a gesture of affection that surprised Matthew. “Best we get inside, out of this cold.”

“Oh … yes, sir! Yes, of course! But … what was that awful noise?”

“Hell freezing over,” Julian said. “You’ll recall I said I’d return here when that event occurred.”

“Oh … I … I do recall such.” Windom, obviously the house servant or butler, still couldn’t seem to believe he was speaking to the young man upon whom the yellow lantern light fell. Perhaps, Matthew thought, Julian Devane was himself one of the ghosts who haunted this place. “Yes,” Windom said after a few more seconds. “Cold out here. Please … do come in.”

They entered the house, the door—with its large brass knocker in the shape of an anchor, Matthew noted—was closed behind them, and Windom set about lighting several other lanterns from the wick of his own. As the glows strengthened, Matthew saw they stood in a vestibule with a black-lacquered floor and a similar black-timbered staircase leading upward. Various colorful signal flags hung from hooks above, and foremost in this room was a marble-topped table upon which stood an intricately detailed model of a ship-of-the-line complete with its myriad of sails, lines and gunports, the entire construction being about three feet in length.

Julian was already moving onward; as seemed to be his nature, he waited for no man’s invitation. He shoved open a sliding oak door on the right and went into another room, with Windom close behind carrying two lanterns. Matthew heard a door open and shut with a solid-sounding thunk upstairs and he figured the rear admiral was soon to be sailing into view. He walked into the room after Julian and Windom and saw he had entered what might have been a combination library and office. The lantern lights spilled over many shelves of books and also a large desk with papers neatly stacked atop its blotter and an inkwell and a supply of feather pens near at hand. The room held several black leather chairs that all faced the desk and seemed to Matthew to look more forbidding than comfortable. On the floor was a navy-blue carpeting, the heavy drapes were of the same hue, there was a fireplace of gray tiles and a few little embers still glowing in the ashes, and on the walls were gilt-framed oil paintings of maritime scenes with the likes of huge sailing ships carving through tremendous waves as lightning-charged stormclouds bore down from the heavens.